In the exploration and recovery of subsurface hydrocarbon deposits, a borehole or wellbore is typically drilled into a reservoir rock formation using a rotatable drill bit that is attached to a bottom hole assembly at the end of a drill string. Once the wellbore is drilled to a desired depth, one or more large diameter metal pipes or tubes (referred to as casing) are set inside the drilled well to aid in the drilling process. The casing forms a major structural component of the wellbore and serves several important functions including, but not limited to, preventing the formation wall from caving into the wellbore, isolating different formation zones to prevent the flow or cross-flow of formation fluid, and providing a means for maintaining control of formation fluids and pressure as the well is drilled. Therefore, an appropriate casing design for a planned well must account for the expected casing wear in order to mitigate the chances of a costly failure in the casing during drilling and/or production.
However, it is generally difficult to predict the actual amount of casing wear that may be expected during a drilling operation. Thus, it is important to have a reliable technique for analyzing the causes and effects of casing wear during both the planning and real-time operating phases of the drilling operation. Conventional casing wear analysis techniques are available for predicting the locations of severe casing wear, e.g., based on data indicating the parts of a drill string known to cause high side forces. However, such conventional techniques often fail to provide an effective way to quickly analyze the effects of all the different parameters that affect casing wear over the course of the drilling operation.
The illustrated figures are only exemplary and are not intended to assert or imply any limitation with regard to the environment, architecture, design, or process in which different embodiments may be implemented.